Project Jason: The Trainer

It's been about three months now since I've started going to the gym. As my shifts at work end up getting later and later it really makes me appreciate that my gym is open 24 hours half the week. Also because the gym is pretty much dead that late at night. No need to wait for equipment.

And in my last post I was pretty happy. I had gained a bit of definition, about 10-15 pounds, and I'd like to think I'm feeling healthier with more energy? I was able to lift a bit more each time and things were looking good.

And then things started to plateau.

Wut.

I was lifting more, pushing myself harder but I wasn't making progress as fast as I had during the initial few months. I mean, I wasn't expecting to be buff but come on, to an outsider I probably look the same. Thin.

Maybe I was doing something wrong, or my work-outs just weren't as effective as I could be doing them. By some coincidence, my gym was offering a few free personal trainer sessions again. For those who aren't familiar with the last few personal trainers I tried out here's a quick recap:

Trainer #1: Good workouts, but mysteriously bailed.
Trainer #2: Nice guy, but didn't really push me.

And so here I was with Trainer #3, Eli. Seemed nice enough, but the important thing was, would he be able to help me build the muscle I wanted?

Short answer: Yes.

OH GOD MY ARMS.

We only had enough time to do a few half workout sessions, but they hurt. I don't think I could have pushed myself this badly on my own. At least, not without worrying I was going to injure myself due to improper posture or something.

My arms were sore for the next 3 days. I couldn't even get through his chest workout because my shoulder's were literally giving out. This was perfect, this was exactly what I wanted. I felt completely beat up after the work-out and for days later.

If this doesn't get me out of my spaghetti arms and malnourished-looking body, I don't know what will.

Asides from using this.

One of the original reasons that I didn't sign up with Trainer #2 was not only because I wasn't getting much out of the work-outs, but also because I couldn't afford it at the time. This was before I got my full-time job.

Eli is pushes me, I can afford it (still really expensive though), and bonus: he also can work around my stupid late schedule. I signed up for roughly half a year of sessions and we'll see where this goes.

Our first official session begins tomorrow. And I'm excited to see how battered I'll be by the end.

Work Updates

Things at work have gone fairly well. Well as well as things can go I guess. It's still the fall season and things are absolutely busy but it's still bearable. I'm used to doing 10 hour shifts a day and fully expect them. To leave after only 8 hours is unexpected, especially since I'm now being trained to finish up at the end of the night, i.e., stay behind and make sure everyone else gets back safely before I leave.

The joys of dispatch. At least I'm getting overtime. Also, it's dead. So I often do other things while I'm waiting for the last truck to come back.

Shhh... Don't tell my bosses....

The rest of the days are still eventful though. For some reason, no one can get my name right. I'm going to blame terrible phones on either end, maybe bad reception. Most phone calls sound something like this:

Me: Damian here.
Client: Hi Dennis, I need you to...

Or:

Me: Hi, Damian speaking.
Client: David, if you could...

Or even better:

Me: Hello, this is Damian.
Client: Janice, for my order on...

Janice.

How did you get Janice.

How.

But they don't intentionally get my name wrong. It's always funny to have them call back later requesting to speak to "Dennis" only to be corrected by my coworkers that no one by that name works here. It's gotten to the point where if a client asks for a fictitious individual, the client probably wants me.

And most clients are fairly civil. Though we still get the odd individual who is unable to control himself. For example, a few weeks back, this guy who has an order. At one point he, or someone on his site calls to delay the order. No problem. Later, we also call to let him know that his concrete is going to be late, probably going to arrive at X time, because traffic is exceptionally bad. Also rush hour. We like to give clients a bit of a heads-up when we're late.

Half an hour before our estimated arrival time, I get an angry phone call that I can't transcribe because of the language used AND because I had no idea what the guy was saying half the time. I blame his bad phone, him being angry, and his heavy accent. One part of his rant sticks out to me because for a good 10 minutes he was complaining about how last winter he somehow got a cement truck out of a snow bank with a bobcat. At least, that's what I think he was saying.

What I do know is that he kept me on the phone for half an hour until the trucks arrived and then he turned his rage towards the drivers.

He didn't seem to understand that:
a) Someone on his end had delayed the order.
b) Delaying the order made it so that trucks would be right in the middle of rush hour traffic.
c) That rush hour traffic makes things slow.

3 variables that lead to delayed arrivals. Apparently the guys he had working for him also screwed up because the following week we received pictures of the finished job and it looked like someone didn't know what they were doing.

Somehow, this was our fault because we were late. Or for some other arbitrary reason. We really don't know. The sales associate for this client also had trouble understanding him through the bad phone, angry talking, and heavy accent. This continued for about 2 weeks until we cut communications. Also because he had started making threats towards us.

Yelling "HOW OLD ARE YOU?" to one of our senior sales associates is very mature.

In more positive news, my probationary period is coming to end. Which is great. I haven't been fired yet, my coworkers seem to like me. Also, with the end of my probation it means a raise.

More money. I can get behind that.

I just need to get through the end of the month without screwing up horribly or causing any disasters. I make still make mistakes, it's expected, and luckily they're small. But they're still mistakes, and I can't afford to look careless. I just need to get by without making anymore, be super-thorough and I'll be safe.

Also raise.

Happy Thanksgiving

To all my Canadian readers, Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you all ate a ton of food, spent some quality time with friends or family, and enjoyed your day off. I know I certainly did, as it was my first day off in over a month of non-stop working. I slept in past noon and spent the entire day on my computer before gorging myself on food.

For everyone else that isn't in Canada, too bad.

I had a good day.

How is my life going otherwise? I'm still alive somehow. But the reason why I haven't been posting as much is simply because all I have left at the moment is a bunch of half stories. Half completed projects, series of smaller interesting events from work, waiting for things to come in the mail or be picked up, research that needs to be done.

And I don't like telling stories before they're complete. But it's only a matter of time before they start finishing up.

Why do I even have this picture saved on my computer?

Projects Update

Current debt: $9000

Phew! It's about time I've made a significant dent in my debt, I'm now under 10k. Slowly but surely we'll destroy this thing, though because I'm no longer a student I've had to get a new bank account which requires that I have $2500 sitting in it at all times so I don't get charged a fee. A minor setback.

I'm still really pushing to find time to work on my projects. It's hard to find it in you to continue being productive after a long day of work. I just want to let me brain go to waste in front of my computer as I watch videos of cats doing stupid things.

But I've managed to do some work, and so, update time.

I could watch this all day.

Project Derp:

Goal: $$$$

I experienced a massive traffic drop last month for some reason. Are things running slower? Is it due to summer ending? I can't say for certain but I'm certain it affected my already minimal profits. It also doesn't help that for all of September I maybe put in 2 hours of work, at best.

That being said, I may have found a way to get Phase 2 to work. Fingers crossed. It be nice to finally have this project be self-sustaining. I'll make a post about it when it happens, and then finally get working on Phase 3.


Project Vegas:

Goal: Travel 

I finally got the required items in the mail to get this project running. I'm still reading through a few things to make sure I do this right. Even though I have the most disposable income I've had in a long time, I still want to make spend my money efficiently.

I have a time limit of 3 months. I hope this works.

THEN I CAN FLY LIKE THIS CAT.

Project Pandering:

Goal: Learn and re-learn skills.

This one has been iffy to gauge because it's an amalgamation of smaller little skills that I don't think qualify for individual projects. So on a whole, this project has had quite a bit of time dedicated to it, but the individual components are a bit lackluster.


I recently got more hardware and I'm tinkering with things as we go along. There are just so many tutorials and guides online. No way I'd would have been able to learn how to do this (or even consider doing this) half a decade ago.


Project Jason:

Goal: Exercise

This is still the only project that I'm consistently dedicating time to. Though I'm "averaging" 3 times a week. Sometimes I go twice, and then I make up for it the next week by going 4 times. It's a bit of a balance really, the only time I can meet up with people is for dinner after work so it's either meet with friends or go lift weights.

Unfortunately my feet are still cramping up. I think it might be because I've been so tired lately. The lack of sleep might be the cause because I've changed shoes, reduced reps and weight, etc. etc.. I think the fatigue might be affecting my appetite as well, I'm eating less and that's not good. I can't gain weight if I'm not eating.

Nom.

And that's this month's update. Debts are being paid, I'm trying to be productive outside of work. And I'm slowly losing my mind because my sleep is deteriorating. I'm actually gasping awake now in the middle of the night, which I think is a pretty clear sign my sleep apnea is worsening.

Fear not though, the appointment I booked weeks ago is finally coming up. I'll make a post about that when it happens.